SPEAKERS

Cameron Shackell

Cameron Shackell is Founder and CEO of technology startup ActiveADAPTER and a final year PhD candidate at the Queensland University of Technology. His new theory of finite semiotics, appearing in a series of papers in Semiotica, bridges the gap from semiotics to technology. He has brought attention to semiotics at major technology conferences such as CHI 2018, and is currently developing software to bring big data to opposition analysis.

Topic: Semiotic Explorer-Software for Automated Opposition Analysis
Opposition analysis (based on the semiotic square) is commonly used by semioticians to compare brands and other objects on an XY-style diagram. For example, opposition analysis may be used to monitor Coke and Pepsi’s positioning in terms of red/blue, classic/trendy, baseball/football, and so on. The positioning of brands along axes of opposition requires considerable ongoing investment in research. Ultimately, however, no definitive method exists for calculating these values. Brands are plotted largely based on the interpretations of analyst, which are very personal and may or may not be accurate and up to date. This can lead to clients devaluing the outcomes. The presentation will demonstrate new software called Semiotic Explorer that produces opposition analysis diagrams automatically from text and other digital data.

The software provides a number of benefits to complement traditional methods:
1. Unlimited amounts of data can be used.
2. It is inexpensive compared to traditional research.
3. The method for producing results is transparent and consistent.
4. Analysis can be performed and browsed in as many dimensions (axes) as required (hence "explored" for oppositions.
5. Analysis can be updated in real time as more data becomes available to track movements over time.
I will spend a couple of minutes explaining the theory behind the software from my PhD research before demonstrating the functionality on a stream of tweets.

Three takeaways for the Semiofest audience:
- A better understanding of opposition analysis
- A look at the cutting edge of computational semiotics
- Awareness of possibilities for using software in their own projects

SPEAKERS

Hamsini Shivakumar

Hamsini Shivakumar is a co-founder of Leapfrog Strategy Consulting, one of India’s premier brand consulting companies as well as of Semiofest, the un-conference for applied semiotics practitioners. Prior to starting Leapfrog in 2007, she was Strategy Head at JWT Mumbai, member of the National Planning Council at JWT India and Regional Planning Director for Asia on Unilever. Her twenty-five year career spans consumer insights, brand strategy, communication planning and innovation. She has worked on a diverse range of product categories, brands, consumer groups and virtually every kind of strategic issue or challenge that brands face. She is a trained Semiotician and a prolific writer on consumer and brand issues in International and Indian publications.

Topic: Plotting the trajectory of socio-cultural change in India- The Relevance of the Long View

Many brands associate themselves with a higher purpose or a higher order benefit…e.g: Coca-Cola tries to associate itself with Happiness, Hero Pleasure Scooters with freedom and fun for women, Vicks with mother’s love, Royal Stag Whisky with mega-success.
Hence Clients ask questions from time to time, for providing an understanding of how these notions are changing as the society is changing? Does women’s empowerment mean the same thing today as it did 3-5 years ago or happiness or success or luxury for that matter?
And more importantly, to provide a future forward view on how would this evolve /change/mutate / transform in the future, in the coming 3-5 years.

Answering this question for clients involves cultural trend analysis, which in the semiotic toolkit, translates to the R-D-E framework. This involves spotting the emergent concepts/codes and hypothesizing that some or all of these will enter the mainstream world-view and become dominant codes over time.

Some of the particularities of India make this linear, cultural trend analysis fraught with difficulty and potential error. This include:
a) In India, the past is never the past in the sense that it is over and done with. In the Indian context, there is a living past and a living present that intersect in unpredictable ways. There are always multiple players in the present who can and do draw from the 4000 years of history / mythology for their current agendas. These players could be political parties, jati groups, cultural activists, media channels and brand marketers. Several recent examples can be pointed out – the Padmavaat controversy over the film, the Jallikattu controversy, the Judgment on the Hadiya case etc. As a result, the interplay between signifiers and signifieds in cultural symbolism is dynamic and rhizomatic.

b) There are changes of form but not of substantive meaning. The externals change but the inner core of values and beliefs does not change. The classic example of this in the religious sphere is the virtual participation in temple rituals or other types of rituals via skype or the computerizing of horoscopes. In the secular sphere, this often involves change of clothes and fashion, from one generation to the next. When interpreting the ‘signs’ of change, the Semiotician needs to be careful in unpacking these phenomena.

c) An allied phenomenon is the change of form but not of underlying structure. For example, India has had a dual language structure – the language of the elite and the language of the common people, in society for thousands of years. For centuries this was Sanskrit-Prakrit. This was followed during Islamic rule with Persian-Vernacular. Since the British introduced English education, we have the same dual structure in which English has replaced Sanskrit / Persian. As above, when interpreting the ‘signs’ of change, the Semiotician needs to be careful in deconstruction of the phenomena.

d) Hybrids, composites, fusions and other forms of syncretic absorption of the new with the old are visible all round. The past is mutated and transformed, but never fully dropped. When studying hybrids, the semiotician’s deconstruction of signifiers/signifieds/codes and code structures is not that straightforward.

e) Substantive changes and Resistances: The dialectics of change invite resistance and push back in significant measure, never-the-less some substantive changes are accepted and changes happen very quickly whereas in other areas they don’t. It is difficult to anticipate which concepts/laws/notions will meet with great resistance and which ones won’t.

Apart from all of the above, when it comes to topics such as women’s empowerment or success or happiness or luxury, there is so much written and shown about it, that in an age of google and social media, it becomes difficult to offer fresh insight (something that doesn’t feel like, “I knew this all along”) and a reasonably accurate prognosis/a forward perspective.

Keeping all these factors with respect to socio-cultural change in India in mind, the paper will propose two ideas for offering a more considered and thoughtful prognosis to Clients. The first is taking the long view; taking the vantage point of 100 years or 75 years, identifying illustrative or seminal texts written by great writers as the point of reference or comparison with the present. The second is a layered model/framework of culture, based on analogy with geology, the earth’s crust vs. the earth’s core. The comparisons can then help the Semiotician identify the hard cultural bedrock that is difficult to shift, the inter-mediate layers that are shifting and in what direction and the surface level signifiers and their mutations. A real example will be provided in the area of women’s empowerment to illustrate these ideas.

SPEAKERS

Karin Sandelin

I’ve been doing semiotic analyses at Kantar Sifo for 15 years, and regularly hold lectures and workshops on visual communication for strengthening brands. My background is in multimedia education technology, design management and art history.

Topic:Finding the sense(s) in semiotics
In January 2018 two Semiofesters - Karin Sandelin (SE) and Thierry Mortier (BE) - got together and launched a new department at Kantar Sifo (Sweden) called Sensemiotics. The emphasis of the department is to translate sensorial, semiotic and digital insights into authentic actionability for clients. Without the senses, semiotics would not exist. Without semiotics, there would be no actionability. And, when it comes to authenticity, that’s a judgement call both in terms of sensorial input and semiotic content and relation.

In life, semiotics is the bridge between what we discover in the surrounding environment and how we act upon those discoveries in a manner that is true to who and what we are. Our approach in applying semiotics follows the same setup, it’s to get the input on the one hand in sync with the output on the other i.e. relate. Bridging the divide between findings from multi-sensory research and the commercial, measurable applications in the market. Change makes this process a continuous (re)iteration.

Our take on the theme of ‘Metanoia, as adaptive learning in changing times’ is to interpret it as the basic description of semiosis or just … life. The never changing status quo is change. It’s why Peirce’s most important insight on semiosis is that it never stops.

By identifying what actually changes, the environment and us, it becomes clear what does not change namely how we process those changes. The insight hidden here is that change-makers and change-leaders have a very Darwinian approach, in that they tweak, adjust, modify and transform the environment … indirectly installing change within us.

Sensemiotics now has three semioticians and one sound strategist in the team. Operating on the premise that “we don’t have to have all the answers ourselves, but have to know who does” meaning we reach out to a network of external sensorial experts depending on the needs of the case.

Our presentation combines cases with the methodological innovations we had to develop based on sensorial and semiotic insights. Identifying where environments changed without impact on behavior and where they changed with impact on behavior.

SPEAKERS

Thierry Mortier

I’ve been active in the field of semiotics and contemporary art for 16 years and specialize in visualizing complex structures. As a regular speaker at Semiofest, published in Semiotica and Semionaut.net I’m an active developer of semiotic methodology.

Topic:Finding the sense(s) in semiotics
In January 2018 two Semiofesters - Karin Sandelin (SE) and Thierry Mortier (BE) - got together and launched a new department at Kantar Sifo (Sweden) called Sensemiotics. The emphasis of the department is to translate sensorial, semiotic and digital insights into authentic actionability for clients. Without the senses, semiotics would not exist. Without semiotics, there would be no actionability. And, when it comes to authenticity, that’s a judgement call both in terms of sensorial input and semiotic content and relation.

In life, semiotics is the bridge between what we discover in the surrounding environment and how we act upon those discoveries in a manner that is true to who and what we are. Our approach in applying semiotics follows the same setup, it’s to get the input on the one hand in sync with the output on the other i.e. relate. Bridging the divide between findings from multi-sensory research and the commercial, measurable applications in the market. Change makes this process a continuous (re)iteration.

Our take on the theme of ‘Metanoia, as adaptive learning in changing times’ is to interpret it as the basic description of semiosis or just … life. The never changing status quo is change. It’s why Peirce’s most important insight on semiosis is that it never stops.

By identifying what actually changes, the environment and us, it becomes clear what does not change namely how we process those changes. The insight hidden here is that change-makers and change-leaders have a very Darwinian approach, in that they tweak, adjust, modify and transform the environment … indirectly installing change within us.

Sensemiotics now has three semioticians and one sound strategist in the team. Operating on the premise that “we don’t have to have all the answers ourselves, but have to know who does” meaning we reach out to a network of external sensorial experts depending on the needs of the case.

Our presentation combines cases with the methodological innovations we had to develop based on sensorial and semiotic insights. Identifying where environments changed without impact on behavior and where they changed with impact on behavior.

SPEAKERS

Hanna Stolpe

I’m a semiotician with interest in media communication regarding democracy and political communication, but also cultural studies and arts. My interdisciplinary background brings new perspectives on our mediatized society – from scent and taste to visual and textual communication.

Topic:Finding the sense(s) in semiotics
In January 2018 two Semiofesters - Karin Sandelin (SE) and Thierry Mortier (BE) - got together and launched a new department at Kantar Sifo (Sweden) called Sensemiotics. The emphasis of the department is to translate sensorial, semiotic and digital insights into authentic actionability for clients. Without the senses, semiotics would not exist. Without semiotics, there would be no actionability. And, when it comes to authenticity, that’s a judgement call both in terms of sensorial input and semiotic content and relation.

In life, semiotics is the bridge between what we discover in the surrounding environment and how we act upon those discoveries in a manner that is true to who and what we are. Our approach in applying semiotics follows the same setup, it’s to get the input on the one hand in sync with the output on the other i.e. relate. Bridging the divide between findings from multi-sensory research and the commercial, measurable applications in the market. Change makes this process a continuous (re)iteration.

Our take on the theme of ‘Metanoia, as adaptive learning in changing times’ is to interpret it as the basic description of semiosis or just … life. The never changing status quo is change. It’s why Peirce’s most important insight on semiosis is that it never stops.

By identifying what actually changes, the environment and us, it becomes clear what does not change namely how we process those changes. The insight hidden here is that change-makers and change-leaders have a very Darwinian approach, in that they tweak, adjust, modify and transform the environment … indirectly installing change within us.

Sensemiotics now has three semioticians and one sound strategist in the team. Operating on the premise that “we don’t have to have all the answers ourselves, but have to know who does” meaning we reach out to a network of external sensorial experts depending on the needs of the case.

Our presentation combines cases with the methodological innovations we had to develop based on sensorial and semiotic insights. Identifying where environments changed without impact on behavior and where they changed with impact on behavior.

SPEAKERS

Karen Cham

Professor Karen Cham is a critical design practitioner who works with technology. With a background in experimental electronic arts, she made her first website and touchscreen in 1994, and is now an expert in design methods for complex digital products, services, business models and strategies. Her research concerns narrowing the 'semantic gap' in the user experience (UX) by developing emotional engagement methodologies. Current R&D is in computational semiotics towards nudge mechanics, neuro navigation and neuro transformation.

Topic: Designing Change; NeuroMedia As A Metanoic Practice

As a creative artist and design practitioner, I have only ever been concerned with theory as a reflection on practice. A British Art School design education, the same one that made Jonny Ive what he is today, teaches semiotics as a way to create meaning, not only to deconstruct and apprehend it. Successful industrial design practice is thus the creation of a productised experience of meaning; one that is inhabited and made real in circulation as cultural capital; Jonny in particular seems to have done rather well out of this.

A designerly commitment to truth to materials also means I have come to understand any medium as a technology, and a commitment to the relationship between form and content causes me a concurrent fascination with the mode of transmission as part of this materiality. My research has thus always been into the process whereby constructed images, such as those seen in product, advertising and film, become real; the relationship between ‘the sign and the signified, the simulation and the social, the model and the real’ (Cham 2011); or the affordances of the designed image. I’m a semiotician.

As I lived and worked through the transition from electronic to digital media, my research evolved to focus upon closing the semantic gap between users and machines via novel methods in human factors. I’m now therefore a computational semiotician. Stemming from Lakoff and Johnsons master work, and using post-structuralism, semiotics and complexity theory, in 2006 I designed a computational ontology to teach a machine to construct or deconstruct the metaphor of Italianicity using Roland Barthes deconstruction of the Panzani Pasta ad. In 2009 I started using Brain Computer Interfaces (BCI) to generate insights into end user responses to metaphor. I have since combined Deleuzes notion of culture with the algorithmic approach manifest in parametric design to develop a set frameworks, methodologies and tools that I call ‘rhizometric design’; for designing meaningful, quantifiable and algorithmic user experiences and behavioural changes.

Using eye tracking, facial recognition, galvanic skin response, heart rate monitoring and EEG to measure pre-cognitive engagement, I can quantify affordances, locate and isolate values, embed agency and nudge transformation, individually and collectively. I have delivered quantifiable branded multi-platform user experiences; isolated libraries of branded product semantics for mass customisation tools and lead effective digital transformation of cultural legacies by building and migrating value chains. I have re-appropriated brand value mechanics as an intervention in addiction and designed and built systems that monitor mental health or engineer critical thinking. I have worked on measuring emotional engagement in gameplay to discover a correlation between peaks and troughs in attention span and a games Metacritic score and through reverse engineering, explored the agency of perceptual, semantic and aesthetic cues for navigating content using BCI Interfaces; that is, interaction with digital content by thought.

In 2011, I published my proposal for defining NeuroMedia; designed media content that has been either informed by, created with or developed for, any type of Brain Computer Interface (BCI). NeuroMedia content thus incorporates, either in its production, distribution or consumption, biometric data sourced from the subconscious mind of users. I am now developing Cognitive UX design patterns to assist in isolating ‘nudge mechanics', 'neuro-navigation' & 'neuro-transformation' paradigms to guide valuable & ethical singularities in IoT, robotics & immersive environments that we will require as 5G accelerates the need for personalised, locative, value driven DevOps systems in ubiquitous and pervasive environments.

SPEAKERS

Fangxing Huang

Fangxing Huang was born in Beijing and raised in New Jersey. Currently she lives in Shanghai where she works at Inner Chapter, an idea studio. Having lived all her life wedged between the proverbial East and West, she is interested in the ways globalization cross-pollinate cultures and lead to different new growths. She believes that culture is a living, evolving thing that thrives on change and new influences.

Topic: The Evolution of Meme Beasts on Chinese Internet
The popularization of Web 2.0 was a turning point for Chinese netizens, a life line for those who needed a way organize, exchange ideas, and keep independent discourse alive in the age of unrelenting government surveillance and censorship. It wasn’t long before the BBS forums became breeding grounds for not only dissenting words, but also seemingly absurd forms of expression in the forms of elaborate and obscure memes, puns, and jokes. In the country that ranks worst in internet freedom in the entire world, the amorphous secret language of codes protects Chinese netizens by mutating at the impressive speed of amphibians exposed to intense radiation.

Memes are able to evolve with such flexibility and easy largely because Chinese language is pictorial, which offers an additional layer of meaning available to imbed extra meaning. So out of the millions of memes that occupy Chinese Internet, what makes the animals so special? Animals remain potent symbols for positive and negative human qualities and attributes, and when a new animal is invented, such as the famous Caonima (Grass Mud Horse), it embodies a brand new sentiment. Looking at the meme animals in the nine years since the inception of the Grass Mud Horse, there is a trend of increased politicization, which is indicative of the tension building in Chinese society. In early 2018, the Chinese government clamped down on the sharing of #metoo, which prompted the emergence of the Rice Rabbit (rice bowl & rabbit emojis), and for the first time a Chinese meme animal is part of a global movement, a sign for things to come.

Key takeaways:
1) See patterns in the rapidly changing Chinese Internet landscape
2) Continued pictographic heritage of Chinese language in the digital age
3) Globalization of information vs. Chinese censorship/isolation

SPEAKERS

Sonia Marques

Sónia Marques is a Commercial Semiotician based in Lisbon, Portugal. Her activity started in 2003 when she launched “Indiz”, the first market study in Portugal specialised on Semiotics. At Indiz, Sónia contributes to brand creation and development for high-profile accounts (Sonae, Auchan, Carlsberg and NOS). She also lectures Visual Semiotics at Porto Business School (Oporto) and holds degrees in Sociology, Economy and Communication Studies.

Topic: Creating neologisms to provoke and share change

Applied in the creation of neologisms, semiotic techniques are an effective way to provoke change and share the future. Why?
Because when a semiotician creates neologisms based on the understanding of cultural systems, he/she generates intelligibility about the future.

Consider this:
- To change language is to change reality, therefore new words are a fundamental step to changing society and promoting new behaviours. New ideas are made real when they are given a new name. As “the new” can only be understood through language, neologisms are a uniquely powerful way of giving people access to new ideas.

- Creating concise terms instead of long explanations facilitates the understanding of new concepts and ideas. Indeed, it is a fact that most speakers of any given language tend to dislike wordy explanations. A new phenomenon described in ten lines can come across as complicated, strange and bizarre and may even be “rationalised” into the wrong category, creating long-term problems with comprehension. On the other hand, a good neologism is a clear and systemic way to describe a new phenomenon.

- Finally, the creation of neologisms allows new phenomena to gain legitimacy. Since key notions in a given culture are ideas that have been lexicalised in a single term, thus avoiding any need for extended explanation for their expression, creating neologisms brings social relevance to new phenomena. In other words, semioticians can work alongside visionaries in order to create new terms for new ideas and legitimise new phenomena, thus promoting their social adoption and sharing.

We need to invest in neologisms. To make it simple. To make it easier to say and express an idea. But, above all to insert a new idea into the interrelated meanings of a culture.
Marketing visionaries should consider neologisms if they want, for example: 1.social importance for the actions associated with their projects; 2.legitimacy for their projects; 3. behavioural change that promotes their product category.
In short, neologisms are an ideal way to change behaviour, share new ideas and categories, break down taboos and open new frontiers, and semioticians can create new words in order to promote new behaviours, combat prejudices and give people access to novelties.

SPEAKERS

Maximino Matus

Max Matus is a researcher at Mexico’s National Council of Science and Technology (CONACYT) and a research fellow at the College of the Northern Borderland (Colef) in Tijuana. Max has an extensive experience in consulting for the public and the private sector. He earned his Ph.D. in Sociology at Wageningen University in Holland and a M.A in Semiotics at Tartu University in Estonia. Max Matus is the research director of Semiosfera consulting, an innovation consultancy firm established in Mexico City.

Topic: Culture and nonculture in the industry: how do Semiosfera consulting helped a multinational company in Mexico to create a better work atmosphere?

This presentation reflects how the paired concepts of culture and nonculture developed by Tartu-Moscow School of Semiotics are useful to evaluate the work atmosphere of a company/organization and to promote a positive cultural change that is able to generate a better relation among factory workers and administrators. The study was held in the summer of 2017 in a community located in Western Mexico, a region that is well known because of it‘s high rate of migration to USA. At that time the company was facing problems to retain workers due to migration, but also because of the presence of many multinational companies in the area. Even more, the company was on it‘s way to increase it‘s production capacity in 2018 and to achieve this goal they had to double their workforce, however it was very hard for them to retain workers.

In order to attain this problem Semiosfera consulting made a deep field research inside the factory and in the communities where workers used to live. The results showed that there used to coexist multiple antagonistic cultures inside the factory that while denying each other were promoting a permanent state of conflict and the dropping out of workers. In other to face this problem Semiosfera consulting developed a complete intervention strategy to create a new inclusive culture inside the factory. In this presentation we will discuss the methodology used in the study and the main findings.

SPEAKERS

Lyudmyla Zaporozhtseva

Director of semiotic research at the marketing research agency “Enjoy Understanding” (Moscow).
PhD (cand) in semiotics (University of Tartu) specializing in semiotics of contemporary mythology.
Worked as a consultant in branding semiotics, founded a consultancy agency Hub221 (Estonia). Program co-ordinator of the 5th Semiofest in 2016.
Since 2017, a lecturer and a trainer in semiotics bringing together academic semiotics and application of semiotics for marketing purposes.
Works with visual semiotics, music semiotics, spatial, and social semiotics.

I will present a recent case of re-coding an image of young Moscovian singer. The theoretical framework of this case is based foremost on Tartu-Moscow semiotics of myth and my own theoretical positions elaborated within my PhD thesis about semiotics of mass culture mythology.
My Client had a concern, How to re-create a coherent artistic imagein order to become more popular for mass audience. The project consisted of two stages, 1) to de-code the Client's present visual image and 2) to re-code her image in a way it becomes coherent and reflecting inner identity of the singer.
During this research I applied techniques of:

- visual analysis of media representation of the Client (photos, videos, images, costumes, decorations, facial expressions, colors of dressing and hairstyle),
- musical semiotic analysis: to define the vocal persona of my Client,
- analysis of her lyrics,
- competitive and contextual analysis: analysis of competitive environment in the same genre to dig into cultural context and to compare her image with other artists.

The results evidently demonstrated a semantic gap between vocal persona and a visual image of my Client. I presented results with a semiotic square that helped me together with her brand-team to choose strategically important territory. After the territory was chosen, I encoded it with a mythologeme of Mother-Nature covering core values, visual and verbal codes and other discursive strategies for public communication.

Three takeaways:
1. Semiotics of myth can be involved as an important applied tool for marketing purposes.
2. The archaic universal symbols can acquire contemporary forms and can be re-coded within new context in purpose.
3. Specific mythologemes can be used in show-business in order to build coherent images of artists.

SPEAKERS

Ashley Mauritzen

Ashley Mauritzen is a commercial semiotician, cultural analyst and trend spotter,
based in the style hub of London’s East End. Having previously worked as a
successful fashion journalist, she has been providing powerful strategic insight
(with a creative edge) to leading brands since 2010. Youth, luxury, digital culture
and identity lie at the heart of her research – and life.

Topic: The Soft Revolution
In the age of facemask selfies and #metoo, the relationship between power and the female body has rarely been more complex or discussed. The previously unspoken dialogue between the individual and social body has mainstreamed, and self-fashioning is widely understood and embraced as an exercise in freedom. In this context, there is no need to take part in a topless protest to make a statement – instead, ordinary British women are embarking on a soft revolution.

From smartphone screens to unlimited limited editions to the colourful cities we inhabit, surface has never been more dynamic. Beauty, fashion and personal care enable British women to embrace this energy by applying it to self-presentation, as they constantly define and redefine the meaning of ‘personal expression’. Earnest holisticism and joyful experimentation combine forces to mobilise a soft revolution, characterised by bold colours, directional looks, polyphonic voices, gentle subversion, and a pick ‘n’ mix approach to consumption, empowered by a warm-hearted ideological emphasis on the emotional benefits of loving and indulging the multifaceted ‘true’ you.

In this paper, I will look at the emergence of a powerful movement in beauty, fashion and personal care, painting a vivid portrait of a new breed of confident and versatile female consumer, out to reclaim command by harnessing the potential of her own state of highly-personal aesthetic flux. The implications are huge: repositioning the brand as enabler and aggregator; the retail outlet as a site for sharing and playful experimentation; and communications as entertainment and inspiration. The paper will be rooted in my own recent work as both a strategist and creative, encompassing the full spectrum from broad insight to practical application.

Takeaways:
- How hipster ideals and aesthetics can be credibly mainstreamed.
- How accessible ‘democratic’ values can be coded in the politicised arena of female self-presentation.
- How brands can effectively position themselves as enablers of and collaborators in consumer-directed change.

SPEAKERS

Wei Fen Lee

Wei Fen Lee is currently Chief of Cultural Intelligence at Quilt.AI, a digital semiotics company that indexes humanity through big data. She has been practicing applied anthropology and ethnography for public and private sector for a good part of the last decade, and specializes in extending cultural and semiotic frameworks for brand and innovation strategy. With an M.Phil in Asian Studies and Literature, she plays in the intersection of both by using cultural and visual semiotics to decode the meanings and manifestations of human lived experiences.

Topic: AI Powered Semiotics: One step closer to predictive semiotics

Digital semiotics is an exciting new frontier for applied semiotics, but what can a selfie tell us, compared to 100,000 selfies? And what can 100,000 selfies on Instagram tell us, compared to 100,000 selfies on Instagram, 100,000 youtube uploads, and 100,000 news articles?

Lorusso (2015) argues that all observable culture is semiotic in nature. But what happens today, when this observable culture expands beyond a human’s singular capacity, to a massive data set that captures more nuances beyond the human eye, is machine-quantified, and able to be validated?

An exploration of skin tones at the Met Gala and its symbolic meanings will be used as a case study to demonstrate the potential for an AI-powered semiotics, specifically with an image-entity machine identification algorithm, This will also show the potential of how the field of semiotics can collaborate with the digital world’s own language, rules, and mechanisms, to understand the universe in more depth and with more predictive power.

Three takeaways:
- The limits of intelligent human design and machine intelligence, and the potential for collaboration
- How semiotics fits in with the machine paradigm of the world
- Predictive semiotics and applications beyond consumer/brand

SPEAKERS

Harmony Siganporia

Harmony teaches in the area of Culture and Communication at MICA.
She has a Ph.D. in social history, and her thesis was on the langue and parole of reformist discourse around the ‘women’s question’ in late-19th century Western India. A practicing musician, Harmony’s other research areas/interests include semiotic and narrative theories, ethnomusicology, gender and performativity, and culture and conflict, with a focus on refugee studies (specifically, Tibetan refugees in India).

Topic: Coding ‘woman’: Patanjali and the problem of modernity

By now, it is an article of faith that, following de Beauvoir, one is not born but “becomes” a woman: we learn to inhabit and enact our gender over a long and rigidly codified process of socialisation. From advertising to the ubiquitous new media landscapes which permeate and suffuse our every waking moment, it is clear that we live with/in/amongst unprecedented and overwhelming visual cultures. There has likely never been a moment as suffused with the mass image (and its dissemination) as our own.

In India, the source domains from where the signifier ‘woman’ has traditionally derived its signifieds has largely been within the sphere of the domestic: it is in relation to her father/husband and other patriarchal figures that ‘she’ has made the most sense. However, as with all signifiers, this too is a dynamic code, necessarily changing alongside the shifting societal concepts which allow it to cohere.
It would be naysaying to deny that the depiction of Indian women across media platforms old and new has remained static. It hasn’t. However, this study is predicated upon the premise that this “change” only becomes manifest in the wake of dual forces, namely a crassly capitalist manoeuvring of the working woman’s disposable income, and the simultaneous bid to contain this new woman within the signifieds of old which fixed her position within a patriarchal society. This study will explore the communication artefacts of FMCG behemoth Patanjali Ayurveda Pvt Ltd - arguably one of India’s largest FMCG conglomerates - to demonstrate how these dual forces play themselves out here, and what this might tell us about the ‘modern’ (or contemporary) Indian woman.

SPEAKERS

Gabriela Pedranti

Gabriela Pedranti holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Communications from the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina and a MA in Contemporary Cinema and Audiovisual Studies (Pompeu Fabra University, Barcelona, Spain). She teaches communication, journalism and semiotics related subjects at IED Barcelona , where she also was the BA (HONS) Fashion Marketing and Communication Course Leader (validated by the University of Westminster) from July 2014 to July 2018. She also teaches at UPF. She’s worked as a communication consultant, journalist and translator/interpreter. At SemioticaStudio, launched with Ximena Tobi in 2009, she does trend, market and social research from a cultural analysis/semiotic perspective. She was the general coordinator of Semiofest Barcelona in 2013.

We’d like to propose a presentation that is linked to the concept of Metanoia in its aspect of adaptation in terms of turbulence, change and opportunity. As semioticians and cultural analysts, we enjoy observing and understanding how well-established concepts change and become new ideas and spaces that gradually are accepted in societies. That’s why we’d like to focus in how gender identities are understood, lived and represented today in Spain and Latin America.

Latin Cultures —in our case, Spain and Latin America— are usually understood by many clients as a homogeneous region, with common ideas, habits and imaginaries. This is not completely true: we have been working for many years in showing them the nuances and local expressions, so as to help them build stronger narratives for their brands and proposals, that really tap into the cultural meanings of each country/region. As Nobel Prize Gabriel García Márquez used to say, Europeans called his work ‘magic realism’, because they didn’t understand the Latin American ways of life. In order to explain these differences and local features to Semiofest international audience, we would like to explore Latin identities related to an important current theme: gender fluidity, its progressions and movements in each of the focused countries. We’ll do this through a comparative presentation about gender issues and expressions in 4 countries: Argentina, Brazil, Mexico and Spain. We will show clear examples of where we come from in terms of defining gender identities, where we are now, and we’ll offer a brief reflection about where we are headed.

This will clearly show the local nuances when thinking about themes such as identity, gender, body, expression… We would like to show how each of these countries have moved from a classic binary opposition (man versus woman) to a more fluid and non-binary one, and in which moment of that journey each of the focused cultures are. Because although they all share common roots and even language in some cases, they have understood, shaped and fought for the meaning of gender in different ways.

SPEAKERS

Ximena Tobi

Ximena Tobi holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Communications (2001), a MA in Research in Social Sciences from the University of Buenos Aires (2015). She is currently working on her PhD thesis about the social meanings of garbage, particularly in university campuses. She’s a lecturer and researcher in media semiotics at the BA in Communication Sciences of the University of Buenos Aires. Between 2004 and 2009 she directed Los Tobi, a research and design studio, applying qualitative research and semiotic analysis to branding and communication campaigns. She’s worked as a consultant and researcher for a broad range of clients, from multinational companies to artists and NGOs. At SemioticaStudio, launched with Gabriela Pedranti in 2009, she does trend, market and social research from a cultural analysis/semiotic perspective.

We’d like to propose a presentation that is linked to the concept of Metanoia in its aspect of adaptation in terms of turbulence, change and opportunity. As semioticians and cultural analysts, we enjoy observing and understanding how well-established concepts change and become new ideas and spaces that gradually are accepted in societies. That’s why we’d like to focus in how gender identities are understood, lived and represented today in Spain and Latin America.

Latin Cultures —in our case, Spain and Latin America— are usually understood by many clients as a homogeneous region, with common ideas, habits and imaginaries. This is not completely true: we have been working for many years in showing them the nuances and local expressions, so as to help them build stronger narratives for their brands and proposals, that really tap into the cultural meanings of each country/region. As Nobel Prize Gabriel García Márquez used to say, Europeans called his work ‘magic realism’, because they didn’t understand the Latin American ways of life. In order to explain these differences and local features to Semiofest international audience, we would like to explore Latin identities related to an important current theme: gender fluidity, its progressions and movements in each of the focused countries. We’ll do this through a comparative presentation about gender issues and expressions in 4 countries: Argentina, Brazil, Mexico and Spain. We will show clear examples of where we come from in terms of defining gender identities, where we are now, and we’ll offer a brief reflection about where we are headed.

This will clearly show the local nuances when thinking about themes such as identity, gender, body, expression… We would like to show how each of these countries have moved from a classic binary opposition (man versus woman) to a more fluid and non-binary one, and in which moment of that journey each of the focused cultures are. Because although they all share common roots and even language in some cases, they have understood, shaped and fought for the meaning of gender in different ways.

SPEAKERS

Mariane Cara

Mariane Cara is a Commercial Semiotician and Cultural Strategist holding a Ph.D and Master's Degree in Communication and Semiotics. With over 20 years of experience in visual communication, strategic planning, cultural analysis and trends research, she has been the head of Comunicara since 2013 and the Brazilian Partner of SemioticaStudio since 2015. In both companies, she conducts projects focusing on how signs and codes are structured, the meanings they convey and their implications for brand strategy.

We’d like to propose a presentation that is linked to the concept of Metanoia in its aspect of adaptation in terms of turbulence, change and opportunity. As semioticians and cultural analysts, we enjoy observing and understanding how well-established concepts change and become new ideas and spaces that gradually are accepted in societies. That’s why we’d like to focus in how gender identities are understood, lived and represented today in Spain and Latin America.

Latin Cultures —in our case, Spain and Latin America— are usually understood by many clients as a homogeneous region, with common ideas, habits and imaginaries. This is not completely true: we have been working for many years in showing them the nuances and local expressions, so as to help them build stronger narratives for their brands and proposals, that really tap into the cultural meanings of each country/region. As Nobel Prize Gabriel García Márquez used to say, Europeans called his work ‘magic realism’, because they didn’t understand the Latin American ways of life. In order to explain these differences and local features to Semiofest international audience, we would like to explore Latin identities related to an important current theme: gender fluidity, its progressions and movements in each of the focused countries. We’ll do this through a comparative presentation about gender issues and expressions in 4 countries: Argentina, Brazil, Mexico and Spain. We will show clear examples of where we come from in terms of defining gender identities, where we are now, and we’ll offer a brief reflection about where we are headed.

This will clearly show the local nuances when thinking about themes such as identity, gender, body, expression… We would like to show how each of these countries have moved from a classic binary opposition (man versus woman) to a more fluid and non-binary one, and in which moment of that journey each of the focused cultures are. Because although they all share common roots and even language in some cases, they have understood, shaped and fought for the meaning of gender in different ways.

SPEAKERS

Arturo Rojas

Arturo Rojas studied Business Design & Communication at the Istituto Europeo di Design (IED Barcelona) and he currently works as a Project Manager, Social Researcher & Trend Analyst for companies such as Google, the Coca-Cola Company, Bacardí, Heineken & UDEM (Universidad de Monterrey). He has collaborated with BMC Strategic Innovation as a Project Leader since 2014. He studied Semiotics with Gabriela Pedranti while in Barcelona, and was also part of the organizing committee of Semiofest 2013 in the same city. He’s specialized in Strategic Innovation, Trend Researching, Cultural Analysis and has worked as the Mexican associate of SemioticaStudio in the last 5 years.

We’d like to propose a presentation that is linked to the concept of Metanoia in its aspect of adaptation in terms of turbulence, change and opportunity. As semioticians and cultural analysts, we enjoy observing and understanding how well-established concepts change and become new ideas and spaces that gradually are accepted in societies. That’s why we’d like to focus in how gender identities are understood, lived and represented today in Spain and Latin America.

Latin Cultures —in our case, Spain and Latin America— are usually understood by many clients as a homogeneous region, with common ideas, habits and imaginaries. This is not completely true: we have been working for many years in showing them the nuances and local expressions, so as to help them build stronger narratives for their brands and proposals, that really tap into the cultural meanings of each country/region. As Nobel Prize Gabriel García Márquez used to say, Europeans called his work ‘magic realism’, because they didn’t understand the Latin American ways of life. In order to explain these differences and local features to Semiofest international audience, we would like to explore Latin identities related to an important current theme: gender fluidity, its progressions and movements in each of the focused countries. We’ll do this through a comparative presentation about gender issues and expressions in 4 countries: Argentina, Brazil, Mexico and Spain. We will show clear examples of where we come from in terms of defining gender identities, where we are now, and we’ll offer a brief reflection about where we are headed.

This will clearly show the local nuances when thinking about themes such as identity, gender, body, expression… We would like to show how each of these countries have moved from a classic binary opposition (man versus woman) to a more fluid and non-binary one, and in which moment of that journey each of the focused cultures are. Because although they all share common roots and even language in some cases, they have understood, shaped and fought for the meaning of gender in different ways.

SPEAKERS

Nainika Chauhan

Nainika Chauhan is a Strategist working out of DDB Mudra Mumbai. A daydreaming enthusiast, she has an awful memory for a 27 year old but a keen sense of reading between the lines. When she is not busy building communication strategy for clients you will either find her doodling or training for “how much food can you fit in your mouth at once challenge.”

Topic: A lot like love 2.0 (Building a brand promise for OTT content based on the changing lovescape in India)
This case study examines the semiotic coding of TV show watching behavior amongst young, urban millennials for a campaign piece by leading over-the-top (OTT) application in India. The sponsor being a contemporary brand wanted to build awareness about their paid subscriptions platform and articulate a promise that went beyond simply stating the rational benefits and instead communicate the emotional payoff in a language that was relevant to the audience.

Consumer deep-dive revealed that this type of global and aspirational content is an identity marker for the audience and has overtime contributed to a cultural packaging of oneself which is disassociate from the traditional societal expectations in India. This contrast is especially evident in the sexual attitude of young adults which is vastly different from the previous generation in India. Indian youth is getting explorative and defying traditional rules of love and dating. Enabled by technology like modern dating applications eg: Tinder, Hinge, Bumble there is slow but gradual emergence of alternative and unconventional forms of relationship such polyamory, open relationships, casual sex, sologamy etc.
But tugging at this change from other end of the rope are multiple conservative forces such as the government censorship, radical ideological outfits and a prevailing conservative mindset, constantly on a defensive from the fear of becoming obsolete.

The power of a metaphor lies in its ability to explain abstract concepts by drawing analogy with seemingly dissimilar but relatively easier to understand concepts. Our case study expounds on how narratives about Love 2.0 and TV show watching behavior (eg: binging) were fused to craft a provocative metaphor into a unique selling proposition as well as an overarching thought for building advertising content for the sponsor to raise awareness about the platform.

Key Takeaways
-Power of metaphors and narratives in building a unique and contemporary language for youth brands.
-How metaphors can enable a language that breaks the social mores and disseminates or encapsulates conversations of social change into smaller more digestible pieces.
-Or a language that can generate steady content over long periods of time that is smart and has high share or talk value and is also in tune with the overall personality of the brand as well as the audience.

SPEAKERS

Charise Mita

For more years than she has fingers and toes, Charise has been a part of building great brands in nearly every category imaginable. By converging consumer and semiotic insights, she helps reframe issues and ideas and inspires brands to see and feel differently about new opportunities to change, innovate, and grow. Her academic work focused on children’s knowledge acquisition and the relationship between language, thought and behavior.

Topic: From Experience to Epiphany: Changing Hearts – Metanoia - in a Post-Screen Age
Upon announcement of this year’s Semiofest theme, my initial exploration began with a Google search resulting in hundreds of Greek New Testament references such as “a transformative change of heart, especially of a spiritual conversion” and connotations of “repentance or reformation.” Clearly these references differed from Semiofest’s “acts of resilience and adaptive learning…” But given worldwide political-ideological turbulences, it’s probably wise to stay away from gods, angels, or other holy deities. And yet, it struck me that stories around religious conversions might open up some interesting avenues…and indeed it did. It led me to issues bubbling up in Experiential Marketing. Mumbai’s reputation as a super-high sensory atmosphere seems the perfect Semiofest location to raise a question of about ‘experiential’ marketing

A RE-Emergent Code: From Visual to Visceral

If we imagine the dawn of humanity, it was the most primal, high sensory and visceral place -- full of dirt, thunderstorms, fire and all manner of wild animals and insects pursuing us. Fast-forward to the Screen Age where we’ve been pleasantly ensconced in the shiny and smooth swipe-y world of gorilla glass, and a return to the wild and visceral was inevitable. In fact there’s been a return to high sensory ‘festival’ events complete with corporate invasions into the likes of Coachella, Burning Man, and Bestival. With the ability for people to do real-time broadcasts via Instagram/FB or Weibo, suddenly, it’s so many festivals so little time. Even luxury brands have given it a try with uneven success. Many brands simply try to overwhelm the senses with energy and swag. So how can brands achieve a change of heart in this over-stimulating world?

Conversion: From Experience to Epiphany

Epiphany: a moment of sudden and great revelation or realization

Throughout the histories of religion, enlightenment, and technological advancements, conversions of belief and behavior often start with a sensory-triggered epiphany-- whether the dramatic biblical conversion story of Saul of Tarsus on the road to Damascus being temporarily blinded by a incredibly bright light and bold voice that caused him to fall down, recognize it as a sign of God, question his life’s mission and eventually become Paul the Apostle, or, perhaps the first time you got high and said to yourself, “Whoa… so that’s what all the fuss is about.”

“Seeing’s believing, but feeling’s the truth” Simon J. Bronner

As cultural and marketing codes move from Visual to Visceral, there is an opportunity to design brand experiences that converge all of that feeling-ness – all that sensory input – and link it to an idea, an aha, a great revelation and epiphany about your beliefs and feelings about a brand. Two or three examples will be shared – a brand’s powerful in-the-moment sensory epiphany, a brand that has lost its way, and swag serving as a touchstone for a brand long after an event.

SPEAKERS

Tanvi Gupta

Tanvi is a doctoral candidate at IIM Bangalore where she is academically exploring cognitive semiotics in visual branding. Being a gold-medalist in Communications from MICA (Ahmedabad), with over seven years of experience in consumer-insights research, Tanvi’s expertise spans both quantitative and qualitative research methods. Over the last 3 years, she has been practicing semiotics and consulting brands on communication strategy by decoding facets of Indian culture.

Topic: Firstness, Secondness and Thirdness of User Generated Content on Social Media
Social media listening is gaining traction in marketing research with semiotic analysis of user-generated content (tweets, Facebook posts, Instagram photos, Youtube vlogs) emerging as a powerful tool to understand culture. What we, as semioticians, analyse as “text” are the signs created by the consumer. Does the sign posted by the consumer reflect the true object? Can it be interpreted at face-value? This presentation aims to apply the sign theory of Charles Sanders Peirce to delineate the firstness, secondness and thirdness of digital artefacts, shared by consumers on social media. What consumers choose to conceal in a photograph is as important as what they choose to show. With the ubiquity of high-definition cameras on mobile phones and apps to crop and add filters to photographs, the final ‘sign’ posted on social media is not necessarily an icon. Focusing on the “creator of the sign”, I apply Peircean concepts of immediate vs. dynamic object, and immediate vs. dynamic interpretant to uncover the process that influences sign creation on social media.

Further, by applying Lakoff and Johnson’s conceptual metaphor theory and analysing iconography of virtual spaces, I draw a parallel between virtual and physical spaces. Through empirical evidence about social media behaviour of new mothers in India, I show that consumers’ lay theories about physical spaces (law of contagion, metonymic thinking) extend into virtual spaces as well. While mothers store hundreds of photos of their child in their phones, what they post on social media differs on firstness (icon), secondness (index) and thirdness (symbol). What’s interesting is that for mothers who believe in ‘evil eye’, the immediate interpretant of their child’s photograph becomes a physical manifestation of the child, vulnerable to the public gaze. Hence, they prefer to post indexical or symbolic images about their child on social media. This metonymic thinking is peculiar to India (Ramanujan), and can be attributed to ‘holistic thinking style’ (Nisbett) that blurs boundaries between physical and virtual worlds.

3 Key Take-aways:
• My presentation will open possibilities of looking at social media texts from different analytical lenses by applying Peircean semiotics
• My presentation will discuss an interesting case study and experiment where the Peircean semiotic lens, along with metonymic thinking, will be used to analyse what new Indian mothers share on social media
• My presentation will also discuss potential application of firstness, secondness and thirdness in designing and experiencing virtual reality and mixed reality spaces.

SPEAKERS

Chirag Mediratta

Chirag is a curious empath who enjoys understanding people and cultures to help clients make a real impact in their lives. He is a qualitative researcher and design thinker by profession and an inquisitive story-digger traveler by passion. He has a keen interest to understand human behaviour, social power structures (gender, caste, class) and the effect of their environment, culture and privilege on them.With over 6 years of experience, he has worked with a range of global brands in the areas of strategy, exploration and innovation for corporate and social research, and docufeatures.
He also works with Instrupad, a playspace for musicians, in the music research vertical and recently interviewed reggae legends like Johnny Osbourne, Skarra Mucci and several more for their reggae documentary that explores the connection of Jamaica and India and the codes of music of the oppressed.

He holds a Masters degree in Communication (MICA, Ahmedabad) and a Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical engineering (VIT, Vellore). He has spent a couple of years in advertising, army and as a food outlet entrepreneur before entering the field of people and culture understanding through research aided by tools and concepts of anthropology, semiotics, ethnography and human behavior.

Topic: Decoding the vegan identity through new media

This research piece will focus on decoding the vegan identity through new age media and explore the role of the symbols employed as markers of this new identity. Further, it will give an insight in understanding the relationship between new media, food and community development through signs and symbols. For example, happycow has become a popular brand to help vegans find cruelty and guilt free food across the world while communicating a vegan ideology through its simple brand name.

In the recent past, many urban youth have adopted a vegan lifestyle for several reasons – health, environment, animal morality, ethics, fitness, spiritual, the new cool and more.
Food is a strong marker of an individual’s identity that connects him or her to their cultural heritage, traditions, eating habits and geographical location. The conscious decision to give up a part of identity to formulate a new one involves symbols that serve as a marker and reaffirmation of this new transitioning identity. Moreover, with the advent of new age media, it becomes easier to reaffirm these codes of being vegan by sharing views and opinions, facts and figures, pictures of food and body transformation, reinvented and innovative recipes, mental transformation, notions of empathy towards sentient beings and much more.

This research will aim at decoding the various symbols of vegan lifestyle and the transitioning identity in the daily life of people by understanding the digital landscape around them and also interviewing some vegans, café owners and experts so that notions of community change through conscious choice and portrayal through new media could be unearthed. Moreover, it will dig deeper in the notion of this new identity that is based not because of enforced cultural values but an individual's conscious decision to adopt a global identity devoid of traditional and cultural heritage.

Takeaways:-
1. Identity construction through food
2. Identity reaffirmation through new media
3. Semiotics for community building

SPEAKERS

Maria Papanthymou

Maria Papanthymou is a founder of LocalTalk semiotic consultancy. She was one of the first specialists on marketing semiotics in Russia, learning from Virginia Valentine and Malcolm Evans. Before becoming a full-time semiotician, Maria spent over 15 years in communication agencies (including Publicis and BBDO), doing all kinds of marketing research for the leading international brands. Maria holds PhD in Social Psychology and MA in Applied Sociology from the State University of Management, Moscow.

Topic: Born in the New Russia. A semiotic study of Rusian youth culture

A semiotic study of Russian youth culture (generation Z or post-millennials). The research is based on the analysis of contemporary Russian media produced by youth, targeted at youth, or representing youth.
Understanding youth is the key to understanding future. Teenagers and young adults absorb cultural changes faster than other social groups and at the same time they play significant role in producing changes.
The new generation of Russian people, which were born in the period of relative economic and social stability, in the environment of modern technologies and global influences, is very different from older generations of Russians. However, Russian teenagers grew up on this land, with its history, climate, geography and cultural traditions. They are definitely different from their peers in other countries.

Some of the ideas that we are going to describe in the presentation:
- Growth of social status of youth. In traditional culture, ‘adult’ means ‘normal’, teenager is ‘semi-adult’, just learning to be real, valuable person of society. Today, adults learn from teenagers. 14 y.o. video blogger may be more popular than prime-time TV journalist.
- New sincerity and post-irony. In status-oriented, serious Russian culture, where visible signs of success and perfection are very important, young people behave completely in the opposite ways. They communicate openly and honestly, do not try to hide their imperfections (not even seen them as imperfections, or ironically exaggerating them).
- Rethinking of the Soviet past. This generation did not live in USSR and in the 90-s, but cultural objects of that periods are very popular among them. Modern youth interprets the past of our country in a very specific way. For many of them, Lenin is in the same semantic space with Santa Claus.
The presentation will include images and video illustrations, including quotes from advertising, TV serials, documentaries, and music.
Takeaways for the audience:
1. Possibility to see how global cultural change gets local interpretation. Cross-cultural life of signs and meanings.
2. Source of insights for projects on the Russian market.
3. A chance to listen to Russian rap :)

SPEAKERS

Sunil Vashishth

Sunil Vashishth works as Vice President - Strategy, at Futurebrands. As an analyst he is forever trying to stir meaning up from things that surround him. His work lies at an intersection of brands and culture, where he attempts to find an osmotic relationship between the two. He is intrigued by the myriad contradictions that India poses and keeps searching for truth that can accommodate them happily.

Topic: Guru’gram: The Virtual Urbanity

Cities usually are organic entities. They grow, take shape, evolve and develop their own culture over centuries and decades. What happens when a city imagines itself into being. How does it create identity markers and a sense of self? How does a new city with people from diverse background assigns itself meaning? How does it agree upon the metaphors and rituals to live by?

The ‘construction’ of Gurugram, despite the imposing skyline and massive infrastructure, does not lie in its physicality. Instead the meta narrative of the city has been created through a virtuality which quickly created spaces for belongingness. In that it is perhaps the first discontinuous city of India. The virtual has mapped itself over the real thereby giving meaning to what was otherwise unfamiliar. It employs a sophisticated language of virtuality to evolve in the way it desires. It hasn’t just been built, it has been posted up.

The presentation looks at the devices used by a new city (Gurugram) for creation of meaning. It explores how its culture and behaviour is dictated through new media. What is the language in which it communicates. What are the said and unsaid rules. It explores the multiple social media platforms that Gurugram uses. How everyday life is woven by the virtual community. Why forums like Gurgaon moms are more context sensitive than Google itself. The virtual structures are guiding and shaping the idea of ‘citizenship’ by letting people know the code of conduct even before arriving in the city. The modalities of living, be it the kind of passion you follow, the issues you stand by or the experiences you wish to have are determined on social media and played out in the city. Gurugram has a power to strip people of their past baggage and impose upon them an invisible social subscription.

Essentially it explores how the idea of past, class and caste structures, social mores, new festivals etc. are mediated through a lived virtuality in Gurugram.

SPEAKERS

Martha Arango

Pioneer in establishing the semiotic analysis in marketing research in Sweden.
Master of Science (Ms.Sc.) in Social Communication from The National University in Mexico. Thesis: Semiotics of consumption.
Worked as a semiotician at Beyond Research, TNS Sifo, Demoskop and her own consulting company Arango Semiotics.
Solid knowledge of different cultures, values and codes, particularly in Latin American and European countries. Has conducted training, workshops and lectures in semiotics for international companies in Sweden, China, Colombia, Hungary, Turkey, England, Spain.
Commission of studies in different parts of the world: Latin America and Europe. Had projects with companies as IKEA, Procter & Gamble, The Swedish Forest Industries, The Swedish Armed Forces, Spendrups (soft drinks & beer), Mobile Operator THREE, KICKS (skin/beauty care products), Arla Foods, Norrmejerier etc.

Topic: How to communicate environmental friendly forest management in Sweden
For centuries The Swedish Forest Industries have been the pillar of the Swedish economy.
The forest products have a key role in the development towards a sustainable, bio-based society although the Forest Industries is perceived as environmentally unfriendly.
Recently the environmental organizations have focused on the forest from the perspective that forest management including using forest for wooden production including paper, pulp, wooden houses, objects, fuel etc. is a threat for the environment.
The Swedish Forest Industries needed to understand how this threat has been built up and the semiotic approach was one way to deepen the understanding.

The starting point was to study the communication from both the industry and the environmental organisations and relate to the meaning of forest and the forest industry in a deeper Swedish cultural perspective.
The analysis showed that forest industry have a traditional, heavy, manlike and unchangeable image and the environmental organisations have successfully presented them as “the bad guy”, unscrupulous, greed and responsible for all evil using high emotional narratives to enlarge the threat.

The result from the study showed a new way to develop a highly positive and environmental friendly way to communicate the Swedish Forest Industry by changing focus from the negative image that the name “Industries” expresses to the positive image of “Forest” which has been shown to have beneficial connotations and values in the culture.

The semiotic analysis identified relevant codes, signs and symbols expressed in the popular culture important for the creation of an attractive story telling about the Swedish forest and an environmental friendly management of the forest. The results of the analysis gave tools to create the new communication platform.

The analysis included 45 pieces of communications taken from the popular culture TV ads, print ads, films, books, brochures magazines and exhibitions that used the forest as a context, background or theme. In the material, where included the most influential campaigns, sponsored by the environmental organizations and the forest industries.

Theoretical models used for the analysis was a combination of various semiotic methods.
•Paradigmatic oppositions to identify the underlying meanings of the manifest content of the texts
•Decoding culture, cultural analysis methodology R-D-E to examine the thread of change in the image of forest and forest management
•Visual shopping including visiting shops, exhibitions and expositions and explore validate relevant cultural codes and detect new trends
•Claude Bremond’s model to get a deeper understanding of the rhetorical formation and reveal the cause of the narrative effectiveness

The audience benefit:
How to transform semiotics to business plans and communication strategies.
How to research phenomena as forest management, environmental movements and other phenomena by semiotic methods.
The use of Bremond’s model to identify the rhetorical argumentations and the effectiveness of special narratives.
Participation in a planned international study regarding the meaning of the forest in different EU countries.

SPEAKERS

Seta Stalberg

Founder and owner at Beyond Research.
Worked as Research Director in the business area, Innovation at TNS Sifo. Specialized on research and consultancy within innovation and branding. In charge of the development of the Qualitative Department at Demoskop AB and Research Director of Trend and Lifestyle, continuously developing qualitative methodology and tools.
Initiated and developed the IQ Network, a European network of qualitative researchers with focus on developing the qualitative methodology and conducting international multi-client studies within the network.
Areas of expertise: The Swedish Forest Industries, The Swedish Armed Forces, Health and healthcare, with clients as Apoteket AB (the Swedish pharmacy), Novartis, Sanofi Aventis, ACO (skin/hair care products, vitamins), Blossom (health magazine). Food and health with clients as Arla Foods, Norrmejerier, Spendrups (soft drinks & beer), Weight Watchers, Chiquita etc.

Topic: How to communicate environmental friendly forest management in Sweden

For centuries The Swedish Forest Industries have been the pillar of the Swedish economy.
The forest products have a key role in the development towards a sustainable, bio-based society although the Forest Industries is perceived as environmentally unfriendly.
Recently the environmental organizations have focused on the forest from the perspective that forest management including using forest for wooden production including paper, pulp, wooden houses, objects, fuel etc. is a threat for the environment.
The Swedish Forest Industries needed to understand how this threat has been built up and the semiotic approach was one way to deepen the understanding.

The starting point was to study the communication from both the industry and the environmental organisations and relate to the meaning of forest and the forest industry in a deeper Swedish cultural perspective.
The analysis showed that forest industry have a traditional, heavy, manlike and unchangeable image and the environmental organisations have successfully presented them as “the bad guy”, unscrupulous, greed and responsible for all evil using high emotional narratives to enlarge the threat.

The result from the study showed a new way to develop a highly positive and environmental friendly way to communicate the Swedish Forest Industry by changing focus from the negative image that the name “Industries” expresses to the positive image of “Forest” which has been shown to have beneficial connotations and values in the culture.

The semiotic analysis identified relevant codes, signs and symbols expressed in the popular culture important for the creation of an attractive story telling about the Swedish forest and an environmental friendly management of the forest. The results of the analysis gave tools to create the new communication platform.

The analysis included 45 pieces of communications taken from the popular culture TV ads, print ads, films, books, brochures magazines and exhibitions that used the forest as a context, background or theme. In the material, where included the most influential campaigns, sponsored by the environmental organizations and the forest industries.

Theoretical models used for the analysis was a combination of various semiotic methods.
•Paradigmatic oppositions to identify the underlying meanings of the manifest content of the texts
•Decoding culture, cultural analysis methodology R-D-E to examine the thread of change in the image of forest and forest management
•Visual shopping including visiting shops, exhibitions and expositions and explore validate relevant cultural codes and detect new trends
•Claude Bremond’s model to get a deeper understanding of the rhetorical formation and reveal the cause of the narrative effectiveness

The audience benefit:
How to transform semiotics to business plans and communication strategies.
How to research phenomena as forest management, environmental movements and other phenomena by semiotic methods.
The use of Bremond’s model to identify the rhetorical argumentations and the effectiveness of special narratives.
Participation in a planned international study regarding the meaning of the forest in different EU countries.

SPEAKERS

Prasunika Priyadarshini

Prasunika Priyadarshini brings over eight years of experience in qualitative research to Karvy Insights. She personifies the ‘East’ meets ‘West’ story: an Odia who grew up in the hinterlands of Rajasthan, finding solace in the bustle of Delhi and Mumbai. Her years in Consumer insights (Nielsen, IPSOS earlier) have taught her the importance of empathy - which she believes, is her key strength. She holds a Psychology degree from LSR and Masters from Delhi University.

Our client one of India’s leading tyre manufacturers wished to develop a compelling communication strategy for motorcycle tyres segment so as to drive consideration for their brand, in a market dominated by a well-entrenched heritage brand.
Their current communication (Be Idiot Safe) took a humorous approach highlighting the perils that Indian bikers faced while riding two-wheelers on Indian roads. While the communication led to improvement of imagery of safety and grip but it did not have enough of an impact on consideration measures. The research required us to focus on:
• Different dimensions of SAFETY, its relevance in the lives of the consumers, and in the tyres context
• Identify codes around MASCULINITY and persona associated with the theme
• Determine role of everyday HUMOUR in the narrative

Tasked with this, our research solution had to factor in capturing an evolving mindset of the changes in the category, the narrative hooks and the overall cultural milieu of meanings of safety and humour.

Our research approach tackled the objectives at two levels:

A INSIDE OUT APPROACH through semiotic decoding: for purpose of insighting
• Conduct an in-depth review and analysis of past communication in the category of tyres
• The R-D-E framework helped to dovetail the various threads that emerged – combining persona, imagery, narratives, exposition and overall moods/ themes that worked in the category

B OUTSIDE IN APPROACH: for purpose of discovery
• Consumers were exposed to an array of narratives (mix of client advertisements, cross category ads) which highlighted on a range of payoffs (rational and emotional), each with different kinds of storytelling styles
• The objective was to arrive at the themes that resonate and the values that connect. This required us to understand their subconscious response to advertising and arrive at the primary driver of the effectiveness rather than focusing on conscious consumption or rejection of superficial claims. The moderation style thus adopted a non-probing, but directional tone – allowing for us to access more stream-of-consciousness responses

PRESENTATION ABSTRACT
Through our research we gauged that the notions of safety remain more relevant than ever today, especially with the larger turmoil of society at large – there is a heightened sense of vulnerability that all feel. However, as opposed to the conventional desire to rebel, become a lone-wolf, the way in which they navigate through this is by developing a coping mechanism that is around controlling their response, as opposed to attempts to change others

HOW WILL IT HELP SEMIOFEST AUDIENCE
1. Apply learnings to categories where decision-making is uninvolved
2. To understand how a challenger brand can take on a heritage brand
3. To identify the hot buttons around evolving humour

SPEAKERS

Radhika Venkatarayan

Radhika Venkatarayan leads the Mumbai Qualitative team of Karvy Insights, with over sixteen years of work experience, across qualitative research (Kantar IMRB), non-profit management (Ability Foundation) and editing (XSEED). Cultural understanding and inter-generational dynamics interest her. Outside of work, she aspires to write. Her short stories have been published in literary journals, and she is to be published later this year. She graduated from MICA and completed a Fiction programme at University of California, Berkeley.

Topic: Arriving at the codes which define safety, masculinity & humour today
OUR POINT OF VIEW: The more things change the more they stay the same

Our client one of India’s leading tyre manufacturers wished to develop a compelling communication strategy for motorcycle tyres segment so as to drive consideration for their brand, in a market dominated by a well-entrenched heritage brand.
Their current communication (Be Idiot Safe) took a humorous approach highlighting the perils that Indian bikers faced while riding two-wheelers on Indian roads. While the communication led to improvement of imagery of safety and grip but it did not have enough of an impact on consideration measures. The research required us to focus on:
• Different dimensions of SAFETY, its relevance in the lives of the consumers, and in the tyres context
• Identify codes around MASCULINITY and persona associated with the theme
• Determine role of everyday HUMOUR in the narrative

Tasked with this, our research solution had to factor in capturing an evolving mindset of the changes in the category, the narrative hooks and the overall cultural milieu of meanings of safety and humour.

Our research approach tackled the objectives at two levels:

A INSIDE OUT APPROACH through semiotic decoding: for purpose of insighting
• Conduct an in-depth review and analysis of past communication in the category of tyres
• The R-D-E framework helped to dovetail the various threads that emerged – combining persona, imagery, narratives, exposition and overall moods/ themes that worked in the category

B OUTSIDE IN APPROACH: for purpose of discovery
• Consumers were exposed to an array of narratives (mix of client advertisements, cross category ads) which highlighted on a range of payoffs (rational and emotional), each with different kinds of storytelling styles
• The objective was to arrive at the themes that resonate and the values that connect. This required us to understand their subconscious response to advertising and arrive at the primary driver of the effectiveness rather than focusing on conscious consumption or rejection of superficial claims. The moderation style thus adopted a non-probing, but directional tone – allowing for us to access more stream-of-consciousness responses

PRESENTATION ABSTRACT
Through our research we gauged that the notions of safety remain more relevant than ever today, especially with the larger turmoil of society at large – there is a heightened sense of vulnerability that all feel. However, as opposed to the conventional desire to rebel, become a lone-wolf, the way in which they navigate through this is by developing a coping mechanism that is around controlling their response, as opposed to attempts to change others

HOW WILL IT HELP SEMIOFEST AUDIENCE
1. Apply learnings to categories where decision-making is uninvolved
2. To understand how a challenger brand can take on a heritage brand
3. To identify the hot buttons around evolving humour

SPEAKERS

Dr.Seema Khanwalkar

Dr.Seema Khanwalkar is a Professor, Adjunct Faculty at CEPT University, Ahmedabad. She is also a visiting Faculty at IIM Ahmedabad, and NID Ahmedabad. Her teaching spans across the Social Sciences and the Humanities. She teaches courses in Semiotics, Semantics and Design, Cultural Anthropology, Design Ethnography, Representation of Space to students of Architecture, Design, and Management. She has guided several Master’s Thesis across institutions. She continues to consult to the Indian Industry, and provides consul to branding and communication strategies. She straddles her academic and her industry inputs with equal passion. She has several international publications and is a regular presenter at the international Semiotic forums.

Topic: The Precariat and the Art of living in the ‘Everyday world’
Everyday living has since long been acknowledged by Genre painters, psychologists, novelists, historians, way before it was intellectualized in the 20th century. It was perhaps the most fundamental form of resilience. Miniature artists in India, the impressionists in Europe, or novelists like Charles Dickens captured the art of living in worlds which were either monotonous, slave-driven, or war-torn, or later, and later amongst the modernists like Baudelaire who emphasized on the pictorial representation of the complexity and transience of everyday living. In a neoliberal world, today, where disorientation is the norm, resilience involves embracing fluidity.

The enemy today is faceless, we face threats from ecology, from economy, from meltdowns, amongst other faceless terrorist activities. How do we capture this world of the ‘Precariat’ in semiotic terms? How do we present the everyday lives, and their living, in terms of the future?

SPEAKERS

Mili Sethia

Mili likes thinking about why people buy things; the awareness that we don't just buy products, but ideologies, lies at the core of her work. With a Master's in Transcultural Design, her roles have ranged graphic designer, semiotician, brand strategist and painter. Her work is at the cross-section of visual culture and popular mythology. Her series of paintings, Esqueer, explores the idea of masculinity within Indian popular culture – and its subversion – through the visual idiom.

Topic: Changing codes of power through the jewelry category for women in India

The Indian market today is thrown by the upheaval of women in various fields, and increase in female buying power: the buying and selling of products for women is taking on differentiated codes. This is a paper that looks to explore what codes of “empowerment” are emerging in women’s advertising in India today – and what status quo they are looking to challenge (or not challenge) within a larger cultural/ mythological context. In particular, it will look to explore the category of jewelry, which is one of the largest and oldest luxury goods primarily targetting women. Jewelry today takes on an interesting new spectrum of codes and meanings in response to today’s market.While on the surface brands like Tanishq and Caratlane seem to empower women to make their own financial choices, the question is what “owning” jewelry of one’s own really signifies when one is a woman. On the other hand, brands like TBZ look at reimagining the quintessential bride as spunky, vibrant, and unafraid to express herself – quite a deep contrast to a voiceless bride that hardly spoke while saying goodbye to her beloved father as she got married in jewelry ads before (such as by Gitanjali).

Historically, jewelry has always been one of the few things that women are allowed to “own”. Even at a time when women couldn’t be landowners in India, they could still “own” and hand down their jewelry. Receiving jewelry from one’s mother-in-law was once a rite of passage into a new (married) life. Today the jewelry category remains relevant for a variety of spaces in which women move, from the most morally- and religiously-coded to the seemingly aspirational world of working (mostly urban) women.

Is jewelry a covert symbol of power, or a more overt one? What are the kinds of social complexity that the owning of jewelry symbolically helps women navigate?

SPEAKERS

Rajan Luthra

Rajan has dabbled from broadcast journalism to crafting brand stories, probing culture and digging narratives that matter. Immersing in markets varying from India to Nigeria, he has designed business solutions for brands across sectors. Desiring to take up linguistics, he enjoys a keen eye on the origin of words, what meaning they hold and how languages interplay. An avid poet and writer, he is a firm believer of stories stirring the soul.

Topic: Identity in flux: How technology and digital media are triggering a more individualistic identity

'Pehchan', is the Hindi translation for the word ‘identity’. However their connotations differ in the Indian context. From primarily a collective sense, identities are rapidly moving to a more individualistic idea. Primary markers of pehchan – family, home and from where one belongs have given way to individual’s identity – profession or work takes precedence. Keeping pace with the rapid, incessant digital development by the day, identity too has been transforming, revolutionizing.

This is an attempt to deconstruct the rise of hyper-individualistic identities fuelled by technology and digital media. What do online usernames/handles (for Twitter and Instagram) mean? Celebrities’ profiles are increasingly shaped on the individual – iamsrk for Shah Rukh Khan, iamJohnBurnett to iamDeepaMehta; a suit followed by ‘netizens’ en masse. What does ‘I’ mean to digital natives? Is there a deeper significance of ‘I’ and Freudian ego?

Further, the parameters of profile creation online have reduced from Name, D.O.B. and endless forms to single entry formats. Snapchat and Instagram do not insist on Location to start with; a remarkable shift from one’s pehchan. With diminishing attention syndromes over digital living, our identities are more visual – with Whatsapp groups being named using only emojis and Facebook algorithms promoting graphic posts over textual ones on our feeds.

Aadhaar is a hornet’s nest. Biometrics, fingertip detection and face recognition go beyond one’s smartphone access. How is the train of Name-Family Name-Village Name identity mutating into a trail of numbers and increasingly binary coded? With the touch-unlock, retina scan open scenarios, where are the innovatively jumbled passwords of things we like, people we love and our dates of significance vanishing?

SPEAKERS

Varun Sathees

A post-graduate in Communications Management from MICA, Varun spends most of his time observing people's behavior with a keen interest in tracing patterns. Hardworking, intuitive and passionate, he is driven to understand the 'why' of everyday realities and broaden his perspective on everything under the sun. Varun has collaborated with marquee brands like Vodafone, Mahindra, Johnson & Johnson, Amazon, and Bacardi among others, bringing a flavor of culture-based insights leading to solutions with impact.

This project involves exploring how the age-old concept of ‘Destiny’ is changing in today’s world. The research will look to establish the ongoing transition through reference examples from pop culture, social movements, and changing consumer behavior in multiple categories. We will look at how our role models have descended from being demigods to accessible aspirations, how the power of a collective overrules individual privileges irrespective of ideological inclinations, and how the Gen Z/Post–millennials interact with their preferred choice of brands in today’s consumer environment.

India is a young nation, with 50% of its population under the age of 25, and about two-thirds less than 35 years old. According to a Bloomberg News analysis, India is likely to have the world’s largest workforce by 2027 (Source: Live Mint, 2017). In these energetic times, we are seeing a tectonic shift in societal & cultural norms that could generate a momentum carrying the new generation into a future of optimism, enthusiasm and proaction. From altering codes of work attire to raising a continuous voice against the establishment, there seems to be a resolute effort towards challenging the incumbent perceptions & beliefs around what they are ‘destined’ for.

The objective of the research is to understand how our traditional meaning of ‘Destiny’ - the life-path assigned & ascribed to each individual basis their age, income, caste, class, race and region – is being constantly countered through multiple channels, in order to pave the way towards establishing a new world order where the only rules that really matter are what one can and can't do.

SPEAKERS

Sumeet Anand

I graduated from Symbiosis, Pune with an MBA in Comms. (Advertising) in 2008 and the last 10 years have marked my transition (still in progress) from full time marketing professional and part time musician to just the opposite of that. I have worked as a market researcher, brand manager and semiotician. Naturally my academic interests include brand communications, consumer and cultural insights and marketing semiotics. At present, when I am not immersed in music, I can be found writing my doctoral dissertation on Applied Semiotics in Brand Communication at FMS, DU.

Topic: Gen Y and dating apps : A semiotic analysis to map user experience
Change is the buzzword and not many countries around the globe have seen the kind of change India has over the past two decades or so. With a billion plus population, of which more than 50% is young, India is a lucrative market and the destination to be for ambitious multinationals. However, with its diverse topography and climate across the length and width of the country, India is a melting pot of varied socio-culture. And, that can make a marketer both excited and worried at the same time.

One of the most significant change that the gen Y has experienced growing up in these fast changing times is the penetration of internet and smartphones in remotest of locations within the country. This is a trend which does not seem to be slowing down with smart phone specs getting better and internet speed getting faster, and both of these at increasingly affordable rates. Unsurprisingly, this has led to online shopping boom cutting across geographies as consumers are spending more and more time online.

‘Apps’, short form of applications is undoubtedly among the most familiar new-age terms today. From online market place, banks, payment gateways to matrimony, dating, utility service providers and last but not the least, ‘social media’, you name it and there is an app for the same.
The app’s interface forms the first point of contact and user’s experience of it can be critical for its popularity and success. Semiotics, simplistically speaking the study of signs and symbols, applied to study interface design and navigation layout of some leading dating apps throws insightful and actionable results. This case study uses structural semiotic tools like Binary opposition and Piercean triadic sign model to decode audio-visual, tactile and other sensorial to unearth deeper psychological meaning structures users experience sub-consciously.

SPEAKERS

Anirban Chaudhuri

Anirban has more than two decades of expertise in brand advisory and integrated marketing communications. He has been a speaker at various national and international forums and has presented case studies at international seminars. He was a contributory speaker at the “Wharton Future of Advertising Round Table” in India and has been a member of the Global Strategic Planning Council of FCB worldwide network in the past. Before joining Great Lakes Institute of Management, Gurgaon to teach he was working as Senior Vice President and Executive Planning Director at J Walter Thompson. He has also worked at marketing research agencies like IMRB International and TNS. He is also pursuing his Ph.D. at IIEST, Shibpur, a Institute of National Importance.

Topic: Metanoia of Semiotic Analyses – Representation and Mediation at Individual and
Collective levels for Marketing Effectiveness
Metanoia is not just a simple change. It is more than just a shift in the way of living and the representation of codes. Metanoia is about change at multi-level. Interestingly R-D-E methodology which is widely used in semiotic analyses that deciphers residual, dominant or emergent representation of a living society ends up being a means to understand change in a linear way. But societies today are more than just a monolithic culture.

The complexity is even higher for a heterogeneous market like India. Beyond the regional and linguistic nuances, there is also the proverbial co-existence of Bharat and India. This adds one more parameter to evaluate – the concept of time. Value systems that might have faded out in the lived culture in India could still be dominant in Bharat. Even India might be giving in to some negotiated codes carried on from Bharat. Similarly Bharat would be accommodating some of the emergent codes of India and making it dominant in no time. Socio-economic and cultural complexity of India merits a different framework - one that enables semioticians to map and model change from multiple angles and perspectives at the same time.

In this context the representational system goes through a constant state of dynamic mediation of values. As a result, it becomes imperative for the marketing practitioners to understand the semiotic blueprint of any market as an agglomeration of subcultures that could be operating at various socio-economic strata in the same time period where one might feel the need to look beyond the R-D-E methodology.

This paper reflects on these aspects and goes further to demonstrate a dynamic approach to semiotic analyses by leveraging a contemporary framework that accommodates the scope of understanding the mediation of codes at multi-level. It observes the individual as well as collective imaginations and lived realities, thus compelling the semiotician to look into multiple levels of the social structure and also consider the interplay of values across the social strata at any given period of time. From a marketing point of view the resultant set of values helps develop a robust and comprehensive bank of insights that would allow moderation of brand narratives based on the mediation reflected through the representational systems of the lived sub-cultures in a large market like India.

SPEAKERS

Anahita Sarabhai

Anahita S. has been in the world of performing arts since the age of 6, performing extensively across Europe, North America, South Korea and within India. A graduate of Sarah Lawrence College, NY, she is a dancer, actor, musician, teacher and poet. She currently teaches Theater & English Literature to IB students and runs theatre based workshops for corporate and NGO clients, often dealing with sexuality & gender sensitisation, as well as curating workshops aimed at team building, leadership and creativity. Anahita is also the Founder-Director of QueerAbad, Ahmedabad's Queer-Ally safe space and online platform.

Topic: A gesture towards a different imagination: decoding queer performance
Repetitive gestures codify human bodies and behaviour. Classical forms of art depend on universal or generalised codes or gesture to express meaning. But what happens to the bodies that fall outside of these expectations? What is the potential that queer bodies have to open up the world of gestures? What can these disruptions reveal about maps of meaning in the world? How can these explorations help us see and even respond to our world differently. Perhaps it is time to push the conversation away from LGBT+ inclusion, to a queer re-imagination.